Voices of the Lost Realm Book II: The Invasion
by Chichiro Ketsueki
Summary: Our two favorite demons just can’t catch a break. Another round of invasions signifies yet another attempt at the conquest of the human realm. Luckily, a familiar face is back to lend them a hand… Sequel. Title subject to change.
1. Alive

**Note:** If the "II" at the end of the title wasn't enough to tip you off, this is a sequel. Please read the first book, "Voices of the Lost Realm Book I: The Tournament" before reading this one. Otherwise, you will be quite lost. 

**Claimer:** Chichiro is mine, as well as the storyline, and any other original characters.

**Disclaimer:** Hiei, Kurama, Yusuke, Kuwabara, Koenma, Genkai, and any other YuYu Hakusho characters used are not mine.

--

Chapter 1—Alive

--

The air was damp, chilled, like a brisk morning in spring. It was not exactly an unpleasant dampness, and was rather quite like the feel of a thin mist. In fact, its crispness was enjoyable enough that Hiei considered keeping his eyes closed to enjoy the feel of it; such was not his way, however, and to be so serene and act so placid would not have felt right to him. Thus, as soon as he was aware that his eyes were closed, they shot open and his crimson gaze swiftly assessed where he was.

As he glowered at the clumps of mist about him, he curled his lip distastefully—he couldn't see a damned thing. Well, at least he couldn't until he heard familiar footsteps behind him. Turning, it was Chichiro that his eyes rested on. He knew as soon as he saw her that he was dreaming. The memory of the familiar ache in his chest that he knew from when he had believed Yusuke to be dead was still fresh in his mind, the image of her body before him still on the backs of his eyelids every time he blinked or closed his eyes, and the sensation of her lips still lingering. Even still, he could do little but stare at her with wide eyes a long time before he mustered, "But you were—!"

"Yeah," she agreed with a grin. "I don't know how you managed it, but here I am. You should ask Kurama about it when you wake up." And then she winked, and before he could ask her what she was talking about, he found that he had shot awake.

_A dream,_ he thought to himself, and then as he considered, _Does that mean Chichiro is still—?!_

"Ah, so you're finally awake," he heard Kurama notice softly from nearby.

As his eyes moved to seek out the fox, they fell first on Chichiro's form…in a bed? He then gathered they were in a demon-style hospital, not too different from the human world ones save their methods. That meant that she was… "Alive…?" he found himself croak aloud, and for some reason his throat was sore as he spoke it.

"Yes, that energy you allowed her to borrow stabilized her until we arrived here," Kurama told him, and finally Hiei tore his eyes from Chichiro to look toward Kurama.

"Energy?" he echoed. Then, remembering Chichiro's words from his dream, he continued, "What happened? Chichiro told me you'd know."

Kurama narrowed his eyes at Hiei, confused. "She…told you that?" he asked, wondering indirectly exactly how she could have done such a thing, having been unconscious since before she had been given the energy just mentioned. Kurama picked up on the fact that Hiei had no intention of telling what he meant, so the fox simply began to explain. "As soon as she collapsed, you gave her some of your energy. I suppose it worked a bit like a demon's version of a defibrillator." At Hiei's silence, Kurama inclined his head to one side and asked, "You don't remember that?"

But even as Kurama had opened his mouth to speak, Hiei had begun to recall doing that. What had possessed him to do that, to give part of his life energy to ensure the survival of another? It was something he had once said he'd never do. "I do," he replied flatly.

"It saved her life," Kurama went on, seeming as though he believed Hiei needed some sort of encouragement.

"Hn." And though he didn't say it, he knew Kurama had figured exactly what he was thinking: _If I had done something differently, perhaps I wouldn't have had to try to save her life._ "So," Hiei began again, in his usual indifferent tone, "we won the tournament, then?"

"It was not truly the focus of our mission to win the tournament," Kurama reminded him. "We were merely supposed to kill Kagura, but in doing so we achieved both. So yes, we won the tournament."

Hiei offered only a small noise of acknowledgement toward what Kurama said. He had suddenly become conscious of the fact that his limbs were very weak and that he felt almost as exhausted as he had after he used the Dragon of the Darkness Flame at its maximum potential for the first time.

"You can sleep again, if you like," Kurama told him quietly. "I will tell you if anything changes." He nodded to Chichiro, and for a moment Hiei thought he saw blame enter the fox's eyes. It was gone as soon as he spotted it, however, if it had ever even been there.

"I don't need to sleep," he muttered stubbornly.

"You overexerted yourself in that battle, Hiei—"

"No I didn't," Hiei insisted.

"—when you used your energy in the manner you did," Kurama finished. "It's natural that you're so exhausted—get some rest."

The fire demon's eyes flickered back to Chichiro.

"I told you," his friend assured him from where he sat in the other chair, "I will wake you if there is anything to tell. Alright?"

"…Hn."

But the stubborn little fire demon already knew he had nothing to argue about. It didn't matter to his body whether he wanted to stay awake or not; it needed sleep, and he supposed it intended to get it no matter what he did. So, he graciously admitted defeat and closed his eyes.

While it was true that he had not expected Chichiro to visit his dreams once more, it had registered as he slipped into unconsciousness that it was a possibility. He rarely dreamed in the first place, let alone of something as strange as a seemingly-normal conversation that he could recall every word of upon waking. Thus, it was to be assumed that her presence in his dreams was not normal. He only had the briefest moment to consider how she was doing it before he once again heard her address him softly from the chilly mist.

"You know," Chichiro's voice began from behind him, "I never knew why my parents were killed."

As he turned to face her, it was obvious in the way he watched her speak that he was listening quite intently. It didn't really matter much to him how odd and out of place the subject was.

"I tried to find out, too—find out why someone would hire an assassin to destroy them. I thought that maybe if I knew why they had been killed, I could find some sort of closure." There was a small smile on her face, and little sadness in her eyes. Remembrance overtook most of the grief that remained within her gaze. "I thought perhaps if they had done something wrong…" She cut off and reformed her sentence. "But no matter what they had done in their lives, I realized it wouldn't make me love them any less, and it wouldn't make the pain of their deaths dull at all." She watched Hiei as intently as he had been watching her for a long moment before she murmured, "Do you know why I'm telling you this?" And when he shook his head, "Because no matter what you did to me in the past, no matter what transpired between us those hundreds of years ago the night my parents were killed, I cannot hate you. And moreover, it does not make me love you any less than I do now."

Demon attraction is not quite like human attraction. While there are the vain of the species that, as with humans, look first to outward appearance, there is a greater majority that look to skill, physical prowess and intelligence. It is rare for a demon to find love or feel it, and rarer for them to wish to die to protect the love they've found.

Chichiro, Hiei had realized the moment he noted her growing affection for him, was an odd sort of demon for feeling either love or protectiveness toward him. Yet, he frustrated himself by finding he was beginning to feel a twinge of returning affection for her. It was a bit like meeting Mukuro all over again, and although he was used to the feeling of fondness now that he had been exposed to its possibility, it didn't surprise him any less who it was directed toward. Not long before, he had seen the fox demoness before him as a cocky screw-up, a bit like Yusuke Urameshi without the insane luck and equally insane plans that helped him to succeed.

He had never understood what it was about caring about another being that made one want to tell their deepest secrets, willingly expose their weaknesses to the one they cared for. It didn't change the fact that he was about to demonstrate it, and he could not stop himself from speaking. "Chichiro," he began slowly, his eyes downcast, "I…"

"Don't," she replied with a wide, gentle grin. "I don't want to hear you say it until you mean it."

For the first time since the end of the tournament, he quirked an eyebrow and adopted a casually irritated expression. "And who is to say that I don't?" The audacity of her, first assuming she knew what he was going to say and then deciding for him that he wouldn't mean it! He stubbornly decided against considering that it was likely she was correct on both accounts.

"Me," Chichiro responded, leaning toward him. Their lips hardly brushed before she pulled back. "I know you care about me," she continued after a moment. "Coming from you, that's good enough for me."

There it was again; that same, annoying sentimentality that made his chest ache when he was in such close proximity with her. What was so great about this prodigal nuisance of a demoness that made him so damned glad she was still breathing?

"How are you doing this?" he asked, unconsciously voicing his prior mental consideration of the reasons behind his care for her while simultaneously asking about her ways of communicating with him in dreams.

"Now, that's cheating," she chided with a grin. "You can't ask me something like that face-to-face, you have to figure it out yourself."

…Blasted lucky woman. Perhaps she did have Yusuke's frustrating, senseless luck, Hiei considered irritably, if she had unintentionally been able to answer both of his questions while not actually helping a single bit.

Chichiro's expression suddenly faltered, and she appeared as though a sudden headache had struck her, lifting a hand to her head. "You should wake up, now," she alerted Hiei nonchalantly, though her brow was still furrowed and she still had an odd look in her eyes. "I think I am."

Hiei quirked an eyebrow of his own. "You're waking up?" he asked, to make sure he'd understood her nonsense.

"Yeah." She glanced over at him, answering his next inquiry before he could even open his mouth to speak. "Yes, I know I am, so don't even bother asking. I can feel pain again."

It briefly registered in Hiei's mind that she meant the wounds she'd gotten during the tournament, but he mentally batted away his guilty conscience and spoke once more, though this time it seemed it would be the last he could fit in: "I didn't sleep very long, you know. I'll only pass out again if I wake up now."

"Dreams are usually only ninety seconds long or so, you know," Chichiro told him with a grin. "Doesn't matter how it seems to drag on or pass at normal speed. What do you think that says about the rest of the time you sleep?" She answered for him before he could attempt it himself: "I think you slept longer than you think. You've gotten plenty." She strode over toward him, then, and for the first time he noticed how healthy and unharmed she looked in this spectral dream form.

With her gentle flick on his brow and insistence of, "Wake up," he found that his body obeyed and his eyes opened.

Shaking his head a bit when he found his vision to be bleary from sleep, he blinked several times and scanned the room. Kurama was also asleep, now, head drooped on his chest and a book lying across his midsection, still open and in his hand. He looked as exhausted as Hiei had felt before he'd fallen asleep.

"Damn fox," Hiei muttered softly to himself. "You said you were going to keep an eye on Chichiro. Can't very well do that asleep, can you?"

A little moan from the bed alerted him to the fact that the dream incarnation of Chichiro had been correct. She was waking up.

She attempted to open her eyes several times (during which, her eyelids seemed especially heavy) before she finally managed to keep them open. They were squinted against the light as she scanned the room, taking in where she was as Hiei had upon waking initially.

A weak grin spread across her face at the sight of the mentioned Jaganshi. "Hiei…!" she whispered hoarsely. "You're alive!"

Although it did not feel natural to him to do so, he found he could not restrain a small smile in return. "That surprises you?"

She didn't answer his question directly, but rather offered one of her own after a small groan of pain. "What happened?"

He quelled the desire to flinch surprisingly well, and he knew Chichiro had not seen what little amount of his grimace he could not hold back. The topic was one he would rather not speak of aloud, still feeling as awkward as he did about the event. Thus, he skipped over the part about Chichiro nearly killing herself for his sake, hoping she recalled it herself. "Kagura is dead—our mission is complete."

"I see," the she-demon croaked back, and her next movement seemed an attempt to sit up; the idea was quickly scrapped when she gasped in pain and flopped back to the mattress, wincing tightly.

"Don't try to move yet, you idiot," Hiei growled irritably. "You're nowhere near healed enough for that."

She grinned wearily at him. "Sorry."

He jolted back the slightest, surprised by her response. Surely, she normally would have answered with a rebuttal against being called an idiot, or at_ least _she would have glared at him. He merely uttered a low, "Hn," and looked away from her.

"I had a really weird dream just now," Chichiro mumbled quietly all of a sudden.

Hiei's eyes drifted back to her. "Really?" he asked, his voice lacking much enthusiasm or curiosity, although it was more because he was not used to showing either rather than because he honestly did not feel them. "So did I."

The weak grin showed on Chichiro's face again. "You first, then."

"No," Hiei replied flatly. "I've no interest in telling mine. Go ahead."

"It felt so real, but I can't remember much of it," she began, gaze averting to the ceiling as she appeared to try to remember it. "You tried to tell me…" She cut off, but Hiei knew immediately what she would have said: '_You tried to tell me you loved me, too._' "You tried to tell me something important," she went on finally, "but for some reason I wouldn't let you finish." Her little smile widened. "I don't know why; I told you that you wouldn't mean it yet or something like that…Sorry, I can't think straight. Weird dream, huh?" The latter part of her explanation had been spoken with a mild flush across her face, and she determinedly didn't look at him even when he answered her.

"Yeah," he agreed with a nod, "I guess that was a weird dream." But he was less focused on the fact that she had indeed had the same dream as him, and was far more interested in exactly why she couldn't remember much or the fact that she had been the one to come to him in the dream both times. "Perhaps you should let the dream-me tell you next time," Hiei told her after a moment, smirking over at her. "You know I hate being interrupted."

Chichiro glanced over at him and, seeing the amusement on his face, she returned the smirk. "But I love annoying you," she whined, feigning disappointment.

"Fine, fine," Hiei conceded, playing along and acting as though her response had irritated him. "You decide. But you should get some more rest, either way."

She raised her eyebrows in minor surprise. "How long was I out before I woke up?"

"A couple of days, maybe." Hiei honestly wasn't sure; Kurama had not told him how long it had been since the tournament's end.

"Then I think I've rested enough," she told him softly, though she immediately contradicted herself with a yawn. Ignoring the wince that followed along with it, she glared steely at Hiei and grumbled, "Shush. Yawns only signify that you're not breathing enough, and that means nothing when I've gotten so used to breathing only as much as needed for sleep."

"Hn. Just go to sleep, will you?" Hiei inhaled a small breath and released it as a light sigh, then went on in an attempt to convince her, "You're not going to be doing much conscious, are you? Staying awake won't help you heal any faster."

"…Fine." She uttered an indignant little noise before turning her head away from Hiei and closing her eyes, looking thoroughly sour throughout the whole thing.

Hiei smirked at her slightly, then stood and headed for the door. He'd been sitting there doing nothing too long, and unlike Chichiro, he now didn't have much of an excuse to continue doing so. Besides, he hadn't explored their surroundings much yet; he had little idea where they were save for the fact that there was a hospital wherever it was.

--

"Are you sure you should be pushing yourself like this, Chichiro?"

Arm hanging around Kurama's shoulder and supporting herself by leaning on him, she glanced at the fox that had just spoken, grinning. "Oh, come on. I said I was fine."

"I think you should wait until you've healed some before—"

"Yeah, I _know_," she interrupted with a little sigh. "You said that about fifteen feet back." Offering him a reassuring smile when she spotted his doubtful look, she continued, "I really am okay. I'm healing fine, and thanks to those painkillers, I _feel_ fine, too." Shifting her glance forward once more, she went on to mutter, "I just really want to bathe. Sue me."

Finally deciding to concede, Kurama said nothing in reply.

They were not very far from the arena that had been used in Kagura's tournament, though they were far enough away that Chichiro had requested Kurama and Hiei to find somewhere closer for her to bathe than the spring she had spent so much time at before the tournament's end. She had not been too surprised at their willingness to comply to her request, as she suspected they both—yes, even Hiei— merely would have felt bad if they had said no to her when she was in her current state.

Kurama had come back relatively quickly and told her that Hiei had found somewhere quite close, and the fox demoness had requested that they head out immediately.

Until now, Kurama's incessant fussing over her had not stopped save for a few, insignificant breaks. Chichiro was relieved that he'd finally given up, despite how amusing it had been to see someone like him so flustered over something so simple.

Although she had resisted thus far simply as not to spur any more spats of worrying from the kitsune demon that was helping her, Chichiro had been badly wanting to ask how much farther the walk would be, having started to feel fatigue a few minutes back. She had nearly gotten to the point when she would decide it was worth the fuss to ask about it, when they came upon the place.

"Wow," the fox demoness breathed softly. A small pool lied beneath a waterfall, filled with flat, smooth stones, and a small trickle beyond the pool drew the current away from the waterfall into a small stream. It amused Chichiro somewhat when she realized that she was surprised Hiei had come upon a place so serene, and that it had been him who had found her place to bathe in the first place.

"Where would you like me to wait for you?" Kurama asked.

"Wherever," she replied with a shrug, already beginning to wriggle out of her shirt unconcernedly.

Although her bandages covered most of her torso, Kurama still glanced away and spoke toward the trees. "Would you like me to leave you some new bandages to change into?"

"That'd be great," Chichiro said with a grin, although she knew the expression had gone unnoticed. She was quite unabashed to unravel her old bandages before Kurama had the chance to leave. Demons had different views on modesty, after all.

Poor Kurama, however, had been corrupted of this calm view during his years in the human world, and he turned his back to her fully more so that she could not see the flush that had come to his face than so that he could not see her. "I'll be off, then."

"'Kay."

"You can find your way back, right?"

"Sure can," Chichiro confirmed, slipping out of the rest of her clothing as she was stepping into the pool.

"Alright." Kurama prayed his exit did not look as hurried as it had been.

Chichiro had not noticed his discomfort or unusually quick departure, however, as she was far too involved in enjoying the cool water to notice much of anything. Hoisting herself up onto one of the flat rocks just beneath the rush of water, she lifted her head and allowed the soft spray to wet her face, dipping her feet into the base of the waterfall.

"Your wounds seem to be healing nicely," a monotonous voice noticed from the side of the water.

Leaning forward a bit and bringing her head back from where it had been leaning into the falls, Chichiro grinned casually at Hiei. "Yeah, try telling Kurama that."

"He will stop making a fool of himself about you as soon as you stop having to lean on him to walk," Hiei responded. He, too, had been raised with the morals of a demon and thus saw nothing odd about the manner of their meeting. "He has a right to be concerned if you're weak enough that you can't get this far on your own."

"I guess." She shrugged again. "I say he'll be a worry wart even after my wounds are nothing but scars, but I guess I should be glad he cares, right?"

"Hn."

The fox demoness slid off the rock, wading back through the pool, which was only about three and half feet at its deepest. "Crap," she muttered as she reached for the bandages Kurama had left by the water's edge, "I forgot to bring something to change into." Glancing at the sad little pile of torn clothing she'd just slipped out of, she went on, "I'd rather not put those back on until I at least got the blood out of them. Might want to repair the tears, too…" Her cat-slit eyes lifted to Hiei. "Could you grab me something else, if it wouldn't be too much trouble? You guys did get the stuff from my room in the arena, right?"

"Kurama did," Hiei confirmed, quirking an eyebrow at her request. "Do you really think it would be trouble for me?"

She grinned lightly at him. "No, but I can't just order you around, can I? I think you'd kill me if I tried it."

"Hn."

As Hiei set off to fetch what he'd requested, he wondered exactly why her jesting comment just then had made him flinch, if only lightly. Was he really still _that_ affected by the event at the tournament's end? _Disgraceful_, he thought to himself as he lifted one of the folded piles of clothing from the nightstand beside the hospital bed Chichiro had spent the last couple of days in. _I'm acting as though I'm human._

Ignoring this, he wordlessly headed back to give Chichiro her change of clothes. Sentimentality, he decided, was just something he'd have to get used to.


	2. The New Mission

**Claimer:** Chichiro is mine, as well as the storyline, and any other original characters.

**Disclaimer:** Hiei, Kurama, Yusuke, Kuwabara, Koenma, Genkai, and any other YuYu Hakusho characters used are not mine.

--

Chapter 2—The New Mission

--

"You should be more aware of Kurama when you're around him, you know."

Hiei's casually chiding comment surprised Chichiro. Quite honestly perplexed by what he could have meant by it, the she-demon echoed indifferently, "Aware of him?"

"He's spent the last twenty odd years in the human realm," he explained, strangely willing to submit to the fact that Chichiro was of the type that would often need explaining to. "He's adopted their ways. Don't undress in front of him anymore."

At that, a devious grin spread across her lips. Hiei, she had noticed, had been acting far too comfortable around her lately. He didn't seem to notice or mind his own change outwardly, but even though it not unwelcome to Chichiro, she still had to take the chance to try and get him back to acting normally. Such a drastic personality change was odd for the short Jaganshi. "What, are you jealous?"

The comment, designed to irritate him back to his old self, failed to fulfill purpose. It did, however, shake him back to his previous mannerism. "Jealous of _what_?" he replied scathingly, rolling his piercing ruby eyes sideways and up at the fox demoness he was supporting on his shoulder. "He couldn't even look at you."

Chichiro raised her eyebrows. "Couldn't? What do you mean by 'couldn't'?"

Hiei, honestly, could not think of a way of explaining it that made sense. After all, demons were not bashful about nudity, but at the same time they wore clothing even when not necessary. Humans just wore clothing always, both when needed and when not, and were uncomfortable around nakedness. "Humans prefer clothes on," he decided upon finally.

"Oh," Chichiro accepted surprisingly easily. "Well I wish I'd known. I didn't realize humans didn't like seeing—"

"You misunderstand," Hiei interjected in a mutter, exasperated by her clueless nature already. One would think she'd never even _seen_ a human before this mission.

"Well, no point in you trying then," the fox demoness grumbled back, and although they were still a good ways away from the hospital they were heading for, she withdrew her arm from where it had rested around Hiei's shoulders.

Hiei stopped where he was, staring after her. _Females are the most temperamental creatures in existence,_ he considered as he glared away from her, baffled by what could have possibly upset her. And for a while there, he had thought she was finally beginning to make sense to him.

His eyes switched back to the retreating she-demon before him as she stopped suddenly. He thought for a moment she'd either recognized she'd nothing to be annoyed at or that she'd the intent to yell at him for whatever he'd apparently done to anger her. Then, he sensed a familiar spiritual energy he had not felt nearby in several days—Koenma's. His gaze drifted to the sky, finding that there was an enormous, translucent image of the toddler prince's face hovering before the clouds.

"I trust you're healed enough by now to return to Spirit World for your next mission, Chichiro?" his high-pitched voice greeted the fox demoness below, who seemed quite dwarfed.

"Yes, Lord Koenma," Chichiro answered almost robotically, as though she'd been through this exact situation several times and was well-rehearsed in what simple reply to supply. Hiei considered that this was probably true, though he had no idea how many missions she'd been on before this one.

"'Prince'," Hiei growled flatly, walking for Chichiro once more, his eyes skyward, "despite her claims, she's nowhere near healed enough to try and tackle any demonic power just yet. In case you're unaware, she _died_ less than a week ago."

"And the day after his resurrection, Yusuke was given his first assignment as Spirit Detective," Koenma pointed out. "'Less than a week' sounds like a _pretty_ nice deal to me, and I'm sure Yusuke would have agreed."

"And so would I," Chichiro put in, glaring at Hiei with sudden coldness. Something told him that her unfriendliness toward him was not due to whatever had angered her before, but with his defense of her just now. "I'm perfectly able, thank you very much, and if Lord Koenma sees fit to send me on my next mission, I will go."

Following her lead and addressing her with similar coldness, Hiei growled back, "I appreciate that you feel the need to make yourself seem strong, however—"

"_However_," Chichiro interrupted with force, "this is none of your business, no matter how you're looking at it. You are not my employer, are you?" And before he could respond, she went on, "Nor are you my protector. You have no right to be concerned for me."

Bristling with irritation, Hiei snarled, "Tell me, woman, is it your _goal_ in life to sound like an ignorant, arrogant fool?"

"Why you—!"

"Enough," Koenma interrupted, his order only making impact because of its volume due to the size of his current form. "Chichiro, Hiei's right—you are being a bit of a brat. But Hiei, Chichiro's also right—you're not longer her partner, so you have no say in her readiness for battle."

_No longer her partner._ Kurama and Chichiro had both considered it without ever bringing it up with the other, but Hiei had honestly never much dwelled on the temporary alliance he'd made with Chichiro. Even if he had, chances are he would not have thought much of it. Surely, though, they had worked well enough together to merit another pairing for a mission?

The toddler ruler of the spirit world drew in a deep breath, considering exactly when he had been forced to become peacemaker, before he went on, "Now, I've set up a portal for you a few miles from here, Chichiro, if you'd kindly head that way."

"Yes, milord," Chichiro replied, turning away from Hiei and bowing to Koenma before she set off briskly in the direction in which she apparently knew the mentioned portal to be located.

Hiei watched her go, then glared up at the prince, noticing that Koenma was still watching him. "Well? What are you staring at me for?" Hiei grumbled.

"I should be the one asking, 'Well'," Koenma responded.

"And what do you mean by that?"

"Aren't you going to ask if you can go with her?" Koenma asked. Hiei found himself somewhat insulted that he had been seen through so easily. "Kurama has already put in a request to have Chichiro be added to his team whenever convenient for Spirit World."

Rather than leap at the opportunity, Hiei merely muttered in return, "Is she going to make it a habit to kill herself during missions?"

Koenma stared at him in silence a moment before sighing and telling the Jaganshi, "If I'm going to put you on her team again, you'd better make sure she doesn't." And then his image faded, leaving Hiei to smirk only for the benefit of himself.

--

It seemed to Kurama that everything began with the placement of the phone back onto the receiver after he'd hung it up. As if symbolic, it was in the moment after the click that signaled the end of a conversation with his human mother that everything from demon world came crashing back into his life, starting with Hiei. The little fire demon's entrance made the use of the word 'crashing' less of a figure of speech and more of a reality.

The telepath had managed to slip in through the window—which was cracked open halfway and would only allow passage of very thin, small beings such as Hiei—relatively quietly, without disturbing anything in Kurama's room save for the blankets on his bed that were directly beneath the window. Those, which crumpled a bit as Hiei fell back onto them, were forgivable. The damage caused by the enormous, twenty-foot-tall demon that tried to follow Hiei through the same window was not quite so easy to overlook.

It was automatic for Kurama to instantaneously summon his rose whip, removing the unfamiliar adversary's head in single fluid slash, though he realized as soon as he had summoned it that Hiei had killed the intruder seconds before. The jaganshi had strategically decided to use the narrow squeeze to trap the clumsy beast in an immoveable position and had stabbed his drawn sword into its skull at the first chance; such a move suggested that the battle had taken its toll on Hiei, else he would not have gone to such desperate measures to ensure a quick resolution to the fight.

Scrutinizing the fallen beast sprawled across the front part of his room through narrowed eyes, Kurama briefly pondered how he was going to remove it from its place lodged through his outer wall. He then drew in a small breath which he released as a yielding sigh, deciding to at least pretend to ignore the giant demon whose lower half was hanging outside of his house. "Hiei," he began calmly, "why exactly is there a several-ton apparition in my room?"

"To be fair," the Jaganshi muttered back, the faintness of his voice causing Kurama to immediately begin searching Hiei for wounds even before he moved toward the fire demon, "less than half of him is actually _in_ the room."

"All the same," the fox persisted, now walking for Hiei as he spotted the first of what he suspected to be several injuries, "my curiosity lingers."

Hiei only fought Kurama briefly before conceding and allowing him to examine a shallow gash on his shoulder, which was bleeding a misleadingly large amount. "Koenma's orders," he replied sourly, not appearing motivated to explain any past that.

"I see." Kurama released Hiei's arm when the fire demon tried to tug it back a final time, crossing his room and searching through his dresser for the first aid kit he had learned to keep handy. Over the years, Hiei had used Kurama's house as a temporary refuge after battle several times and had often trusted the fox demon to patch up wounds which would have otherwise gone untreated beyond an unconcerned dressing. "Were you assigned to tracking this demon on your own?"

The question was casual enough, but Hiei picked up immediately on the fact that Kurama had asked out of curiosity of Chichiro's whereabouts. Neither Hiei nor Kurama had seen her since the day Koenma had come to fetch her at the hospital, which must have been two or three weeks prior to the conversation they were currently indirectly having about her. "Yes." Without any fight this time around, Hiei offered his arm as Kurama approached him with bandages and salve in hand. "I've only had two missions outside of this one since the tournament. Koenma sent me to those on my own as well." Not wincing or betraying any facial expression that hinted that his wound was being dressed as he spoke, Hiei lifted his cold red eyes to Kurama and asked, "And you? Has the child prince sent you on any assignments?"

Knowing the fire demon meant since Kagura had been taken down, Kurama admitted, "No. I requested that I had a few weeks on my own to try and make some sense of my life here in the human world. I had become a bit preoccupied with the goings-on of Spirit World, you see. I'd somewhat forgotten to pay attention to this part of my life."

Hiei, having never been in a similar situation, was not sure what the divide was like. Thus, he didn't comment on it. He instead addressed the fox's earlier subtle questioning after Chichiro. "Koenma hasn't mentioned that woman to me a single time since he summoned her for her assignment."

Kurama was amused that Hiei had chosen not to use Chichiro's name, acting as though nothing had changed between them since the tournament had started. He didn't comment on that, however, and instead asked distractedly, "Any others?" with an indication toward the injury he'd just dressed. Hiei merely shifted so that Kurama could see his side, which was also freely bleeding, and said nothing. The fox demon, after motioning for Hiei to remove his cloak, returned unconcernedly to their conversation. "Perhaps she had several, smaller solo missions as well. I did hear she partnered up with Kuwabara to stop a less crucial invasion a few days back."

Reaching behind himself and pulling up the lower half of his shirt by tugging the fabric on his back, Hiei straightened to allow Kurama access to his wound, briefly eying it. He then settled on glaring at the large, deceased demon that had caused it as he spoke once more. "I pity her, then." A short silence passed between the two seasoned comrades while Kurama summoned a plant from the demon plane that had the ability to stitch together damaged flesh. As it did so, Hiei broke the quiet that had fallen over them, though Kurama was not sure if he wanted to take his mind off of the stitching sensation or if he merely disliked the silence. "I wasn't aware Koenma still used him for that sort of job."

"Apparently so." The plant was quick-moving, thus Kurama was already able to press a gauze pad against the healing gash. "You know, my break ends tomorrow. I'm supposed to be heading to spirit world for an assignment from Koenma, if you'd like to come along."

"Hn." And though the fire demon's shrug was casual, Kurama was almost sure he could sense severely suppressed anticipation from Hiei's direction.

--

Kurama's prior assumption that Hiei had been hiding excitement at the thought of seeing their comrade proved to be correct. Quite early the next morning, the fox was roused by the fire demon, who asked plainly when they would be heading out. "_When the sun's risen,_" Kurama had replied sourly.

"_No problem there,_" Hiei had alerted him, for, as though he had planned his wake-up time around the assumption of what Kurama would say, the sun was now peeking just over the horizon. The Jaganshi was more than happy to alert him of this.

Thus, they arrived in Koenma's office in somewhat offensively early hours, though Kurama found that the young prince of the spirit realm was not as tired as he and was rather quite awake. "I didn't expect you so soon, Kurama," Koenma greeted him energetically. "I assume this early visit is Hiei's doing?"

"Clearly," the spirit fox replied moodily.

"And here I thought you'd be excited to see me," came another voice—female this time—from just beyond Koenma. From the doorway at the opposite end of the office stepped Chichiro, looking as weary as Kurama felt, but also quite a bit more cheerful.

"Chichiro." The fox demon felt the first grin of the day upon his face. "How have you been?"

"I guess 'well' would suffice for a long, boring tale of all my daring feats," the she-demon responded with good-natured sarcasm. "How've my favorite two boys been holdin' up?"

"Also well," Kurama informed her, though at the mention of 'two' he glanced beside him at Hiei, who'd been silent the entire time. He appeared no different having seen Chichiro, nor did he seem altogether too excited at being near her again after a few weeks. Kurama figured either Hiei had changed his opinion on the demoness since just the previous day, or he was as skilled an actor as ever.

Chichiro, on the other hand, was not quite so used to putting on a façade of indifference, thus her attempt to hide her excitement bore little fruit. She did control her gait as she walked over to them, and smartly gave herself more time to calm down by hugging Kurama first and then embracing the shorter fire demon beside him.

The physical contact seemed to spur a greeting from Hiei. Unconventional as ever, he did not offer a true greeting but rather initiated a conversation immediately. "Kurama told me you were stuck with the idiot on a mission."

Raising an eyebrow, Chichiro asked, "'The idiot'?" Having now met the so-called idiot, she was no longer likely to understand who he meant immediately, as she had only seen the gentleman side of the human.

"Kuwabara," Kurama put in.

"I don't know why you dislike him," Chichiro commented in his defense immediately, to Hiei, though not adamantly. "Sure, he's a little rough around the edges when he's talking to guys, but he was a real gentleman to me."

"I fail to see what part of that was an explanation as to why _I_ should like him," Hiei replied flatly.

Kurama felt a smirk twitching at the corners of his lips, and so turned to Koenma to contain himself. "Lord Koenma, the mission?"

"Ah, yes," the toddler replied in his usual attempt at sophistication, "the mission." He hesitated a moment, as though he believed Kurama would take offense to what he would be told to do. "I'm going to send you to stop a group of Escque," he explained. "Normally the less powerful detectives could handle it, but unfortunately they're all tied up with other matters."

Escque: Corpse-like creatures of little intelligence, created for the sole purpose of destroying the human realm for the gain of demons. They had been a favorite weapon as of late for the demon warlords intent on disobeying demon world laws and trying to conquer the human world.

"Surely you do not insult us by suggesting that we go along with Kurama," Hiei piped up, his crimson glare fixated coldly on the toddler prince.

"I don't recall giving any such order," Koenma replied flatly, "nor do I recall asking you here, Hiei. However, if by 'us' you meant you and Chichiro, then I am—apparently—insulting _Chichiro_ by telling her to go along. You underestimate the size of this Escque patrol."

"And you must underestimate Kurama," Hiei snarled back. "Grossly so, if you believe he requires aid to—"

"Shush," Chichiro cut in, lifting her leg and shoving Hiei gently with her foot. "I'll go and I don't have a problem with it. It's a nice, easy break from the usual stuff and it gives me an excuse to be with you guys."

In what seemed an attempt to look down his nose at her despite her several inches of advantage over him, Hiei replied, "Are you suggesting I intend to go?"

"I'm suggesting you don't have a choice," the fox demoness replied with a smirk, "but I don't think you have a problem with it anyway."

"…Hn."

Kurama restrained a snicker of amusement. He would have assumed Hiei would have refused the mission merely to get back at Chichiro, but it seemed even the fire demon could swallow his pride if he wanted something. The fox never would have assumed a few years back, however, that what the demon would want now was to be with a she-demon. It was difficult, but he bit back a comment describing to Hiei this thought, for the amusement would not have been worth the punishment.

"Well," Chichiro's voice broke into Kurama's thoughts, "shall we get going? That Escque party isn't going to wait for us politely and I'm pretty sure there are a few humans out there that will unwittingly be grateful to us for saving their asses if we leave now."

"Indeed," the fox agreed, smiling at the she-demon before she had turned to head out the portal Koenma had supplied, followed closely by Kurama and the grudging Hiei.


	3. Latent Talents, Revealed

**Claimer:** Chichiro is mine, as well as the storyline, and any other original characters.

**Disclaimer:** Hiei, Kurama, Yusuke, Kuwabara, Koenma, Genkai, and any other YuYu Hakusho characters used are not mine.

--

Chapter 3—Latent Talents, Revealed

--

There was a kind of savage pleasure in her face. Perhaps not pleasure…Perhaps satisfaction. Her eyes were wide, darting to the side with every movement. Focused. Calculated. Taking in everything around her and quickly analyzing it. Understanding.

There was a fluidity to her movements that had not been present in any one-on-one fights she'd taken part of in the past, a seasoned flow to her style…A certain grace.

There was a slash on the left side of her face and blood splattered elsewhere on her cheeks, though it was not her own. Many different, minor scratches littered her skin with a grotesque, somehow beautiful crimson glow.

The woman before him was a warrior, the likes of which he'd never seen. This sadistic spectacle that one would be unable to tear their eyes from, not unlike a train wreck with added finesse, made her true nature bare before the world. That innocent outward appearance, the unfamiliarity with everything around her…It began to make sense when one realized that _this_ was the place she could feel 'at home'. This was where she belonged. This was where she could _live_.

She was exactly like him.

It was hard for Hiei to concentrate on the battle when Chichiro had been presented to him in such a way. Whatever acknowledgement of her skills had been made before was now inconsequential. Where in single-opponent fights she was mediocre at worst and somewhat experienced at best, in a battle against thousands she was likely unmatched. In a battle where there was no true way to _have_ any technique, when one was faced with such unmanageable numbers, she was a _genius_.

Admittedly Escque were not the most intelligent or skilled of opponents. One such as Hiei could kill ten or twenty in a single stroke of his sword without invoking the use of any of his demonic power. It was not the number of adversaries she killed, but the way in which she disposed of them.

If he was not so openly _unable_ to feel any kind of admiration for a being outside of himself, one could have suggested that's what he felt toward Chichiro at that moment.

As the last Escque on the battlefield fell, however, and as she stood there grinning wide-eyed, clearly pleased with herself and the outcome of their escapade, that reason for admiration began to fade. She had just begun to run her tongue over her lips to cleanse it of the blood spatter from her fallen adversaries when Kurama spoke her name, likely as a way to introduce conversation. The instant she heard something beyond her own ragged breath and the slash of the sword grasped in her hand, the savage creature within her was gone, and what many would refer to as a 'real' smile showed upon her face once more. The warrior was tucked away again, hidden safely behind what even she may not have recognized as a façade.

"You were brilliant out there," Kurama complimented, stepping over decapitated and dismembered corpses as he headed in her direction. "Have you been training since we last saw you?"

The fox demoness seemed honestly unaware of why he would ask such a question, and replied with a surprised—though delighted—smile, "Uhh, no. Why?"

Kurama furrowed his brow in confusion of his own before he masked his reaction with a mirrored smile, replying kindly, "Never mind. Was that the last of them?"

"Do you see any others?" Hiei growled flatly as he came to join them, irritated at Kurama dancing around the fact that the battle was over with a question and not merely stating it. Then, as if he believed Kurama's powers of deduction left something to be desired, he confirmed coldly, "That was the last of them."

Sighing after Hiei and quickly deciding it would not have been worth the argument to tell Hiei that his question had not been in honest need of an answer, Kurama turned to Chichiro and forced another smile as he said, "Shall we make camp?"

--

Beyond the crackle of the center fire, their modest camp was silent. There had been a strong breeze earlier in the night, but that had now given way to a certain calm that had settled over the woods. An uncharacteristic calm of a demonic world, to be sure, but Chichiro was too appreciative of it after the battle today to yield to suspicion.

As though it were the middle of summer, the air hung heavily and thickly throughout the forest, hot but not unpleasant besides the humidity. A drop of sweat slipped down Chichiro's scratched face, slicing a clean path through the dirt of battle on her skin before it settled at the edge of her chin, then dropped to the ground. Conscious of it only once it'd left her flesh, Chichiro wiped her chin and then her brow.

"Damn, it's hot in here," she mumbled, though the two men with her in the camp weren't quite sure if she realized and intended it to break the silence or not.

"In where?" Hiei muttered in response. "We're outside, in case you haven't noticed."

"Your powers of perception are stunning," the fox demoness replied with a wry smirk, glancing up from the fire and to the shorter demon across it from her.

"…Hn."

Losing a little chuckle to herself, her eyes dropped once more before shifting sideways to acknowledge Kurama. "You've been quiet too," she noticed. "What's up with you, boys?"

"I wouldn't want to speak for Hiei," Kurama told her, smiling wearily in her direction, "but I'm tired. That was a long battle."

"I guess." Though it had been slight, there had been a pause before she responded. Her agreement with him had only been because she knew disagreeing would bring questions. Kurama figured thanks to this that Chichiro was used to lengthy battles and that the one today had been nothing special, the reason why she would not have understood why he thought it had been long.

"So, Chichiro," Kurama began after a short break of nothing but the crackle of the dead, dry logs on their fire, "are you quite sure that you haven't had any training since we saw you last?"

"_Quite_ sure," she replied, taking on a snooty drawl to mimic Kurama's wording. A good-natured smirk was present on her face when he glanced over to her. "I'm sure someone like you knows to trust what I say the first time," she went on, "so I'll take that to mean for some reason that you want me to acknowledge that you noticed something about my fighting today." Mildly impressed, Kurama nodded and waited for her to finish. She did with, "Alright, I'll take the bait—what do you want to ask me about it?"

"I merely realized that you seemed more…experienced with this kind of battle than with the ones we witnessed in Kagura's tournament."

Hiei didn't flinch at the mention, but Chichiro noticed that his gaze subtly shifted so that he could not see the fox demoness any longer even out of the corner of his eyes.

"You mean I didn't suck as bad," Chichiro corrected, humor in her voice. "I know I'm not very good with one-on-ones—"

"That's not what I said," Kurama interjected defensively.

"But it's how you feel," the fox demoness told him, expression pressing him to admit it. "I don't care, I know it's true. It's not my strongpoint. Frankly I don't know why Koenma was mad enough to send me in there rather than somebody else…Guess he was short-staffed or something."

Desperate to make her see that he did not think so lowly of her skills, Kurama pointed out, "You do very well in spars. I've witnessed myself how well you fight Hiei."

"That's just 'cause _he_ sucks," Chichiro jested, obviously not meaning a word of it. Then, she corrected herself seriously, "We've just fought a bunch. It's easier to read somebody when they're a frequent spar partner."

"I don't appreciate the third-person mention," said spar partner commented.

Adopting a look of surprise, Chichiro cried, "Wow! You _can_ still speak!"

Hiei rolled his eyes at her and again looked away from her direction.

Chichiro smirked.

Ignoring their antics, Kurama picked up where they'd left off: "I suppose that's true. But you handled yourself well with Myogie in the tournament, also."

"Ehh, the second form doesn't count," Chichiro responded with a shrug, acting as though said form were a separate being.

"Oh?"

"Well it's just like the way human bodies work in extreme situations," the fox demoness went on to clarify, again showing that strange, warped knowledge of hers; sometimes she was a book of information on both worlds, other times her clueless response to things made it seem as though she hadn't been to either. "You know how they can have moments of extreme strength if they must? 'S not like you count that as their actual strength, right? It's the same for the second form…It's not an accurate representation of my abilities."

The argument was logical enough, Kurama supposed. "Alright, then. It still reveals your potential."

"Whatever." She halfheartedly chucked a twig at him as though to tell him to drop the subject, then collapsed backward into the dirt with a little grunt. "I think I'm gettin' tired too," she mumbled, groggy voice laden with evidence to support the statement.

"Perhaps we should all get some rest, then," Kurama suggested, not expecting any objections, as he cast Chichiro's previous projectile into the flame. "The next wave of Escque could arrive at any moment, or Koenma could contact us with an update for a change in location."

"Yeah, did you bring that atom phone of yours?" Chichiro asked without looking up, instead draping her arm over her eyes as if to block out the fire's light.

"Cell phone," Kurama corrected with the tone of experience. He was used to the fact by now that any time his cellular phone was mentioned, Chichiro substituted 'cell' with some other kind of small or molecular object. "No, I brought the communication mirror. As I've told you, cell phone reception doesn't carry very well between worlds."

"Well it should," the fox demoness grumbled, for whatever reason sounding very bitter about a fact that obviously didn't actually matter or apply to her. "Humans should have figured it out by now…So freakin' behind the times…" But her voice had been trailing off through the entire statement and Kurama knew she was already half asleep. Thus, he didn't answer, and she didn't make any further comment to suggest that she desired one.

--

Kurama stirred in his sleep as the first clangs rang out in the otherwise silent wood. His body was stubborn enough to keep him asleep through it right up until the moment that Chichiro's body sailed through the camp, breaking a few trees along the way…And not quietly.

"_Fuck!_" she shrieked, leaping to her feet, ruffled but clearly not hurt badly or worried for her survival despite many new bumps that would certainly bruise. Kurama was too stunned by her casually angry reaction to really respond to the surprise of her entrance. "You _jerk_, haven't you ever heard of chivalry?!"

"Wasn't aware that the definition was losing to a woman," came Hiei's snide voice. Following it, the fire demon stalked into the camp over the broken pieces of the shredded trees, sword at his side but ready for his next attack or defense of an attack of his opponent's—Chichiro.

"Fuck _you_!" the she-demon spat, her voice higher pitched than usual and cracking. Obviously she was upset by the outcome of their apparent spar. "That doesn't mean you have the right to—!"

"Right to what?" the shorter Jaganshi replied, his own voice raised. Kurama noticed then that his trademark cloak was missing and he was only wearing his usual black pants and sleeveless black shirt. "Fight you as an equal, as I would any other opponent?"

Chichiro obviously took a moment to consider this, but said moment was a short one. "Yes!" she cried finally, still flustered. "I'm your _comrade_, at least don't try to _kill_ me while we're sparring!"

"The training wouldn't be worth it if I held back," Hiei responded calmly, unconcerned by her reaction. "We are very close in fighting level, so neither you nor I would benefit any if either of us did not fight to our full potential."

"Fine, fine," she snarled back, sounding cooled down but still nothing close to calm. "But even if that's true, _intent_ does factor in. Even if you're doing this to let us both practice, doesn't mean you need to _intend_ to kill me…"

"Right, because our _true_ opponents won't have any intent of the sort."

Chichiro bristled and gritted her teeth, obviously just seething before she continued to shout at him. A small sound, a mix of a buzz and a ring, stopped her in her tracks—the communication mirror.

Shaking his head the slightest and glad that the two black-haired demons with him finally had their focus somewhere other than each other, Kurama pulled the small purple device from his pocket. "Yes, Lord Koenma?"

"The Escque are on the move," piped up the shrill voice of the toddler prince. "That means you all should be, too."

"Understood, Lord Koenma," Kurama replied, glancing over at his comrades briefly to make sure their skirmish was actually over. While both appeared severely disgruntled, they were avoiding looking at the other and instead had their focus dutifully on Kurama. "Where shall we head, then?" he went on once satisfied with their current states of mind.

"The three of you should be experienced enough to—"

But before Koenma could finish saying that they should be experienced enough to sense _that_…Kurama sensed 'that': A massive, radiating wave of demonic energy, unlike anything he'd ever felt. It was not the power of it that astounded him. It was the fact that it came from Escque. For so much power to be given off by creatures like them, their masses must have been...ridiculous, to state it in a way that would not send him into panic. Kurama certainly was not one to lose his cool, but this was beyond even his nerves.

"Never mind," Koenma interrupted himself, looking pleased for some reason that Kurama could not fathom. "I'll check in for an update soon."

And then white noise answered, and Kurama slowly clicked shut the communication mirror.

Outwardly, he was calm. Keeping up appearances was something one such as himself was used to, having to have acted for so many years that he was human. The practice was put to good use now, as his outward calm began to infect his inward panic. The cold, calculating part of his mind—the part, if he had entertained the idea of there being two separate halves within him, one could call 'Yoko'—had already begun formulating a plan for attack. Hiei was a master at the craft of killing. Large groups were Chichiro's apparent specialty.

Nothing to panic about, surely.

"Well," he said as he turned to his teammates, who both looked somewhat paler but determined—perhaps even eager—and feigned quite well that he was just as calm as ever, "we have our orders. Shall we?"

With Hiei walking ahead of them, the three set off. Although the energy signal was strong, it was not close, and they had quite the way to go. The trio did not move quickly just yet, moving at a brisk walk; they would continue on faster when they were closer. "_Don't want to waste our energy before the battle,_" Kurama had said.

Now, the fox demon glanced sideways at Chichiro, having noticed that for the past twenty minutes or so, her eyes had been riveted on Hiei. Eyes flicking briefly to the fire demon, Kurama then spoke up softly in the hopes that Hiei would not hear, "Did something happen between you two?" At Chichiro's honestly clueless look, he elaborated, "You seemed very…heated earlier."

"Ah, it was nothing." She grinned widely. "I just hate getting my ass handed to me, especially by a comrade."

Kurama chuckled and accepted the answer, not asking after it any longer, though silence had fallen only briefly before the she-demon beside him had spoken once more.

"Why has he been wanting to spar so much lately? I mean, I knew he enjoyed it, but it doesn't even seem like it's for practice anymore…Like he doesn't even try." She gazed after the little fire demon then, either giving up or figuring she'd explained herself well enough. There was something almost like depression in her face, but also a longing. Whether that longing was for the Jaganshi before her or a longing to understand him, Kurama was unsure.

"It's just his way of giving you attention," the fox demon replied after a moment's consideration, wondering how Chichiro could say it seemed that Hiei wasn't trying when she'd admitted herself that she'd lost to him quite miserably. "I doubt that Hiei is accustomed to trying to show the people he cares about how he feels for them…Normally he'd just show it by defending them, I suppose, but given the events at the close of Kagura's tournament..."

"It was the other way around," Chichiro continued for Kurama with understanding. "He has to show it another way, I get it, but couldn't he just kiss me like before? All this sparring is tiring me out."

Kurama was well-adjusted to hiding his reactions, but even he was unable to disguise his surprise for a few seconds. When he had successfully contained his response to this knowledge, he echoed with a controlled, level voice, "Kiss? You two have kissed?"

"Once," she agreed nonchalantly. _Twice_, her mind corrected, _because you couldn't help yoursel_f. But she left that out, figuring it was unimportant. She had noticed Kurama's reaction but chose to put on the act that she had not—Kurama surprisingly did not seem able to tell the difference. "I would think that would be an easier way of displaying affection, right? That seems more normal…"

Still processing this news, Kurama responded quite numbly, "Yes, I suppose. Though Hiei, as I'm sure you have realized by now, is not exactly what I would consider 'normal'." Then, quickly, he went on, "I mean nothing bad by that, of course. Hiei would not be Hiei if he _was_ 'normal'."

Chichiro lost a little grin at that, her smile widening when the aforementioned fire demon seemed to feel her glance on his back and turned to glare at them. "No," she agreed without looking away, "I guess not."

Said glaring fire demon stopped, waiting for the other two to catch up to him before he resumed walking. As he did so, he muttered quite disinterestedly, "Just because I don't have fox ears doesn't mean I can't hear when someone is talking about me. Don't we have more pressing matters to discuss?"

Kurama reflected as he noticed that Chichiro was not bothered at all that the Jaganshi knew, that he really had spent a lot of time in the human realm; though he did not show it, he was somewhat flustered to be found out. "I see no need to discuss the ensuing battle," the ex-thief replied in a level voice, outwardly showing none of his minor embarrassment. "We tend to fight independently, so we don't need to plan our strategy or anything of the like."

"That's not what I meant," Hiei snarled back impatiently, glaring intensely at Kurama despite the fact that his apparent transgression had been minor. "There is a rift open—what are we going to do about _that_? We can't very well stay by it for weeks fighting off the Escque and Hell-knows-what else it would throw at us."

Now that the fire demon mentioned it, Kurama could sense an irregular energy alongside the Escque. It felt as though it were an enormous life form, gargantuan beyond compare, with no awareness: A rift, a fissure between two worlds that allowed free passage to all creatures that could get to and through it. It was the method that Hiei had used to come to the human realm in the first place so long ago, though admittedly he'd used a far smaller rift to do so.

"Well, I'm out of practice, but—"

Kurama's attempt to volunteer himself for the job was cut short as Chichiro interjected, "C'mon, boys, you must have guessed by now that I have _some_ use outside of multiple-opponent battle, right?"

_So she has noticed the difference between group and one-on-one_, Kurama noted to himself, wondering then why Chichiro had acted so clueless as to the meanings of his questions earlier in the day.

Hiei continued the conversation before Kurama could think of how to bring it up, however, by muttering curtly, "No, we hadn't. We thought you were useless backup, otherwise."

"Gee, thanks," Chichiro replied, not seeming in the mood to play along and find a snide comment of her own for response. "But you overlooked a pretty large detail then, my friend."

"Does your other talent have something to do with rifts?" Kurama queried with half-hearted sincerity just to get her to spit it out. She seemed to be hoping for some sort of lead-in.

"Yeah," she replied, not sounding enthused with the lead-in that she had been supplied, but not disappointed enough to wait for a better one. "Koenma assigned me to this mission because I've had experience closing nearly all types of rifts. This one seems to be a pretty generic variation, so I shouldn't have any problem doing it."

"I thought that rift-closing took quite a bit of energy?" Kurama pressed, recalling the insane amount of Escque's energy that he had sensed; all three of them would need to be at their peak energy levels to deal with that.

"Hey," the she-demon replied, "better me than you; I'm really not much use anyhow."

Confused by the sad little grin she supplied and why she would say such a thing when she had just commented herself about her talent with larger groups, Kurama attempted to protest.

He was swiftly cut off as Chichiro continued, "The Escque are no problem no matter what energy level you have." Shifting her cat eyes to the side as Hiei gave a nod of agreement, she went on, "But there are also larger foes coming through. You guys can handle them, and I'll take care of the rift and as many Escque as I can."

Again, Kurama was appalled at himself for not having noticed the energy signals sooner—there were entities approaching the rift from the other side as well, preparing to cross into this world. Entities, which had no other name that could be easily translated into a simple tongue like English, were not unlike dragons, worm-like in shape and appearing quite like the Escque to be decaying. They were not pretty creatures, to be sure, but they were very large and quite powerful. Hiei and Kurama would easily be a match for one, or several, but they took concentration and time to kill.

"Understood," Hiei and Kurama agreed at the same time, glancing at each other briefly after doing so. Kurama smirked lightly, though Hiei just glared away from his look an uttered an irritated, "Hn."

Each with their own roles in mind, they set off into the ensuing battle.


End file.
